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A Two-State Solution with Dr. Zachary Lockman

April 27, 2017

Zachary Lockman, professor of History at New York University, visited Duke University from February 23–24, 2017. He presented his new book Field Notes: The Making of Middle East Studies in the United States (Stanford University Press, 2016) and discussed the importance of area studies and Middle East studies. Together with Charles Kurzman (Sociology, UNC-Chapel Hill) and Adam Mestyan (History, Duke), Lockman also participated in a panel on the depiction of Islam in the West and on modern-day interactions between the Middle East and the United States.

In this video, Lockman addresses the Israel-Palestinian conflict and the possibility of implementing a two-state solution in the near future. He notes that just a few decades ago, the dimensions the conflict would assume were unimaginable, particularly because the building of Israeli settlements had hardly begun. Although it is hard to see a current solution to the conflict as it stands, the tide has begun to shift. Lockman explains: "It was difficult to make much headway in talking about this. Again, that's changed. So, with all that goes on today, especially on American campuses, for example, there's much more open and frank and honest debate about the Israel-Palestinian conflict than there was space for twenty, or thirty, or forty years ago. So, that's progress, I think." Furthermore, better analysis and information on the origins of the conflict and the "demythologization of Zionism's interaction with Palestine" is sure to make a positive difference.

Lockman's visit was sponsored by the Duke University Center for International and Global Studies, Jewish Studies, Cultural Anthropology, the Department of History, and the Duke University Middle East Studies Center.

DUMESC is part of the Duke-UNC Consortium for Middle East Studies. The consortium combines the strengths of our center with those of the Carolina Center for the Study of the Middle East and Muslim Civilizations.